The Broken Bride
by RhetoricalLove
Summary: Dean dies for Sam, and Sam is willing to risk the end of the world to see him again. AU. Dark!Fic. Based on Ludo's 'Broken Bride' saga. First-person POV. Ambiguously gen.
1. Broken Bride

**Disclaimer:** The titles to the seperate chapters, and the story itself, are taken directly from Ludo's album, and I lay no claim to the characters portrayed within. Please, don't sue!

-

Dean died today; I watched his face as the invisible hounds tore into his chest, throwing bits of skin, gore, blood everywhere as they dragged his soul to Hell. I saw the light in his eyes go out as I held his lifeless body close, listened to Lilith's laughter as she stood in the doorway just beyond my reach. When she raised her hand with intent, white light washing through the room, touching the ceiling and walls, caressing my skin with a slight tingle, she must have realized that she couldn't kill me. Not that way.

I paid her no attention when she left, fleeing the body that she'd stolen from Ruby. Ruby, the demon whose offer I should have taken as soon as she'd mentioned it. My powers could have saved Dean. My gaze was drawn back to his silent form once more, still held in my arms, his warm blood seeping into my ruined shirt, sticking it against my chest. A cry ripped out of my throat, loud and sorrowful for my lost brother.

-

The last time I'd seen Bobby, he told me to stay on the straight and narrow, to keep hunting, or if not, to stay with him for a while. Somewhere beneath all the guilt and grief, I was gracious towards his offer; having a place to stay and recuperate would be nice. Sullenly, I declined though, because I knew that this wasn't going to end with me recuperating and getting over my brother's death.

As we buried Dean with just a cross that I'd trussed together as a marker, I knew that this wasn't going to end until I could feel him alive and breathing in my arms once more.

He'd sold his soul to save me—and now I would stop at nothing to bring him back.

-

"Why won't you take me?" I pleaded, clutching fistfuls of his button-down in my hands. He just shook his head, looking down at me sorrowfully. "Why won't you bring him back..."

The demon cooed, his hand rubbing my mussed brown hair. I barely felt the fingers; they slipped through the greasy strands so easily; I hadn't washed in over a week. I was down on my knees, no more dignity left after a month of living without _him_, my breath scented like whisky as implored and prayed that he'd help me. "I can't, rules are rules, Samuel." He replied softly, listening to the sobs as they raced through my body.

I hitched in a breath and let go of his shirt, watching him leave like the countless other demon's that I'd faced at thousands of different crossroads across the country. None of them would help me, even if I offered to go after only a month of time had passed. Nothing I said or did could convince them to bring Dean back for me.

-

I was pinned against the wall by one of Lilith's demons when Ruby finally found me, after two months. I had wanted to die, so I'd taken her life and walked into a trap, somehow hoping that they wouldn't make my death easy for me. I owed it to Dean, who was undoubtedly being torn to shreds by the demons in Hell, as some kind of twisted penance that I thought I deserved for being the cause of all his suffering.

"What the fuck, Sam!" Ruby breathed when the demon had dropped me to the ground, eyes flickering orange and yellow light as he died. She was in my face, wearing a new body, could probably smell my intoxication, stupidity on my breath as she inhaled. Her body was warm when she hoisted me up, but not comforting like the warmth of my brother, when he held me after a hunt that'd almost gone bad. I shied away, but she shushed me until I closed my eyes and let her lead me away.

-

"I'm not drinking your blood, Ruby." I said, even as my eyes tracked the movement of a red droplet on her forearm, spilled from the cut that she'd just inflicted with her knife. She'd explained just how much more power I'd have if I went through with it, and I understood that I needed that. But the part of me that retained my humanity refused to perform such an inhuman act.

I protested even as I locked my jaw around the cut, sucking so hard that I heard her intake a gasp of air. There was nothing intimate about the way I bit down on her skin, forced the blood to keep flowing as I lapped it up, feeling it like fire in the pit of my stomach.

It made me high, so high that I thought I could do anything, that I could kill Lilith and walk into Hell myself to save Dean.


	2. Tonight's The Night

Each demon that I found, that I exorcised and killed with my mind lead me a bit further towards my target. I was sure of it now; once Lilith was dead I'd open the Devil's Gate once more and walk into Hell to find Dean. I was strong enough, I was on could nine when I drank blood from Ruby—from the other demons before I sent them on their way.

I felt as if there was nothing in the world that could stop me.

-

"You're insane," the pretty blonde bit out, staring me down with cold grey eyes. Lilith had taken an older host instead of her usual little girl. It wouldn't have mattered to me either way; a demon was a demon, no matter what it was wearing. "You're not strong enough to kill me."

Ruby was at my side, like she always was. She didn't know it, but after Lilith was dead, I intended to kill her as well. She'd helped me, but that didn't mean that I trusted her. I'd pin her to the wall, drain her of her blood, and send her back to Hell. That'd give me the last boost of power that I would surely need to fling the doors of Hell wide open.

It didn't go as I wanted though, with Lilith pinned against the mausoleum in the centre of the room, her body convulsing as I pulled the demon out of her chest and burned it into nothing. Blood ran from the lifeless blonde body, dribbling into a sigil that I didn't recognize on the cool marble expanse of the floor. Ruby was laughing beside me, congratulating me, talking about _Lucifer_ and how I had '_finally done it!'_ I turned to her, slammed her against the wall bodily before she could explain what was happening, and sunk my teeth into her shoulder. My hand on her forehead kept her still as I drained her of her blood like a vampire, or a junkie getting a fix.

When I let her fall against the floor, I felt nauseous. It was not a feeling that I was used to, I hadn't felt sick for a month, not since I started training with Ruby, taking blood, killing with my mind.

It didn't occur to me that maybe I felt that way because I'd started the apocalypse, good intentions or not.


	3. The Lamb and the Dragon

Two weeks later and Lucifer had found himself a host body and was walking the earth. Every hunter I'd run into knew it was my fault, that I'd been the one to break him out of his celestial cage and raise him to Earth. I was just as hunted as the creatures that had come with the Devil, demons and monsters searching out victims. They didn't understand that it had been through good intentions that Lucifer had come, that it was all for Dean, to bring him back.

Angels had come to me in my dreams, because they couldn't find me otherwise. One told me that if they did, they'd kill me, because I was a threat to them. They told me that if I hadn't interfered, they'd have been able to pull Dean out of Hell.

I railed at them in my head, screaming, throwing punches. I didn't know how to kill an angel, but if I had known, I would have tried right there in my dream. They had no right to talk about my brother, to _lie_ about him like that.

They left me alone after that, no longer coming to me in my sleep. I took extra precautions to stay away from churches, and religious folk when I was awake, just in case the angels could use them to find me, and make good on their threats of murder.

-

I couldn't open the Devil's Gate, despite many attempts. I tried time and time again, but the Colt was gone, so the unlocking mechanism didn't work. I tried other guns; I tried to force it open with my powers. I tried standing in front of it for three days, through a downpour of rain that chilled through my skin. It didn't open.

And then Lucifer came to me in my sleep one night, telling me that I was to be his host. That I'd say 'Yes' no matter what. That no matter what happened to me, there was no way out. I wanted to scoff at him, to tell him that I wouldn't.

But I knew that if I had the right incentive, I would. And right then and there, while I slept, I asked him the one question that had been on my mind.

"If I say yes, will you let me see Dean again?"

He watched me carefully, his smooth voice coming out in barely a whisper. "Is that what you want? Because I can't bring someone back from the dead, Samuel. If you saw him now, you may not like what he's become."

Something in my gut clenched tightly, but I nodded. I'd done all this for Dean, I'd become something inhuman to get him back. I'd killed half the world just to see him again. There was no backing out now, no matter what promises the Devil made about what Dean had become. "It's what I want. Just a while longer with my brother." The easy smile on his face should have disturbed me; my own reply should have disgusted me. The man that I had been a year ago would never have agreed to this.

But I was different now. And a strange sort of calm fell on my shoulders when Lucifer nodded to me. "You'll be together for eternity, after this world is mine. I promise."

-

I stood outside of the church where I'd killed Lilith, feeling nervous for the first time in months. Lucifer had told me to come, that my brother would be inside when I got here. He'd told me that Dean would be different, and I had accepted that. It didn't matter; my brother was still my brother, no matter what.

But what if he didn't accept me, after what I'd done for him?


	4. Morning in May

"Did you miss me?"

I couldn't get past the colour of Dean's eyes, now milky white when I gazed into them. He looked the same as he had before he died, besides those eyes. He hadn't aged a day, didn't look dead like part of me had supposed. My words choked and died in my throat, and I threw my arms around him in a tight embrace.

"I missed you so much." I muffled the words into his neck, my lips grazing against his skin as I spoke. When I felt his arms wrap around me, returning the embrace, I couldn't help the short, gleeful laugh that bubbled out of my throat.

I'd done it. I'd won. I left the world behind in a blaze of death and decay, set the Devil free and destroyed all of humanities chances at surviving this last catastrophe.

But I had my brother in my arms again, warm and breathing.

And that's all that mattered.


End file.
